I'm a Fellow at the Adam Smith Institute in London, a writer here and there on this and that and strangely, one of the global experts on the metal scandium, one of the rare earths. An odd thing to be but someone does have to be such and in this flavour of our universe I am. I have written for The Times, Daily Telegraph, Express, Independent, City AM, Wall Street Journal, Philadelphia Inquirer and online for the ASI, IEA, Social Affairs Unit, Spectator, The Guardian, The Register and Techcentralstation. I've also ghosted pieces for several UK politicians in many of the UK papers, including the Daily Sport.

The EU Wastes 99% of its High Tech Metals

Recycling less than 1% of high tech metals, Europe has no moral justification to blame the Chinese for restricting their exports of rare earths, Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker from the United Nations Environment Programme argued in an interview with EurActiv.com.

According to a report released by UNEP’s Resource Panel in the spring of this year, recycling rates of metals are in many cases “far lower than their potential for reuse”.

Less than one-third of the 60 metals studied in the report have an end-of-life recycling rate above 50% while 34 elements are below 1% recycling, the UNEP panel found.

The trouble is that the recycling shortfall also concerns very valuable high-tech metals, which are much in demand today, said von Weizsäcker, who is co-chair of the UNEP’s International Resource Panel.

It “applies to rare earths, but also for lithium that you need for car batteries, gallium you need for computers and digital cameras and indium that you need for computer screens,” he told EurActiv.

The weak performance is frustrating for the UNEP resource panel, because unlike some other resources, metals are “inherently recyclable”.

The sadness about this piece of reporting is that it isn’t in fact what the UNEP report said at all. You can read the full report here.

The actual recycling rates are true, yes, but not the point about “waste”. What the report actually says is that many metals do have low recycling rates but these are almost always for very good economic reasons.

To give you an example and one I’ve just used while trying to explain this report to a politician (and boy, do you have to make things simple for them!).

Rhenium is worth around $5,000 per kg*. It’s got a high recycling rate.

Terbium is worth around $5,000 per kg*. It has a very low, under 1%, recycling rate.

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